In physics a quark is a type of subatomic particle believed to be one of the basic constituents of matter. The name was coined in the 1960s by the American physicist Murray Gell-Mann, who initially spelt it quork but changed this to quark after he came across the line ‘Three quarks for Muster Mark’ in James Joyce's Finnegans Wake ( 1939). Joyce's word is meant to suggest the cawing sound seagulls make. It appealed to Gell-Mann, as at the time only three varieties of quark (known as up, down, and strange quarks) were believed to exist.

Origin

In physics a quark is a type of subatomic particle believed to be one of the basic constituents of matter. The name was coined in the 1960s by the American physicist Murray Gell-Mann, who initially spelt it quork but changed this to quark after he came across the line ‘Three quarks for Muster Mark’ in James Joyce's Finnegans Wake ( 1939). Joyce's word is meant to suggest the cawing sound seagulls make. It appealed to Gell-Mann, as at the time only three varieties of quark (known as up, down, and strange quarks) were believed to exist.